I don’t often try to make the food I see on Pinterest. Oh, I’ll pin recipes until my fingers are worn down to nubs, but do I ever go back and try anything? Rarely. Why? Because stuff like this happens. And because I write about craft fails three times a week, so I know better than to expect decent results more than 15% of the time.

Or at least, I should know better.

But sometimes, a pin is just too irresistible. Like when my husband’s birthday rolled around, and I found this brownie ice cream roll recipe on myrecipes.com.

He doesn’t like cake, but plain birthday brownies just didn’t seem festive enough for a party. This dessert, on the other hand, seemed like the perfect way to say, “I really care about your special day! And also, I didn’t get you a gift, so if this brownie ice cream roll isn’t good enough, maybe you should just wish for something better when you blow out your candles.”

So I baked. I cooled. My toddler haphazardly spread layers of peanut butter filling and ice cream. Then I rolled it up… and things weren’t looking good. I shoved it in the freezer and hoped for the best.

When it came out, it was worse than I thought. It looked exactly like a burnt meatloaf – not at all like the sweet, edible birthday tribute I was hoping for. But the guests were waiting! Desperate, I cut in in half, sprinkled some powdered sugar (nature’s food camouflage) on top to disguise its meat-loafiness, and asked my mom what she thought.

“It looks like two armadillos in a snowstorm,” she said. Not very supportive, but unfortunately, very accurate.

Luckily, my family isn’t terribly picky when it comes to fudgy, peanut buttery ice cream confections, and plus, they were distracted by the plume of powdered sugar that erupted when my husband blew out the candles (you’d think I’d have seen that coming, since it happened before in one of my many cake fails, but nope – surprised again).

Thank you for that great post. You had me at fail. And I think you did a great job. I’ve been in similar situations all puffed up ready to replace Martha Stewart then reality sets in. I am glad I didn’t have to try out to be my kids mom.